Russia's Putin to visit Israel in 2010

MOSCOW — Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin will visit Israel in 2010, he said on Friday, following a recent chill in ties between Moscow and Israel's arch-enemy Iran.

Putin's pledge to visit the Jewish state came during a meeting in Moscow with Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who told him: "We would be happy to see you in Israeli in 2010."

"Thank you very much for the invitation. I will definitely come," replied Putin, who also said: "Israel is one of our highest-priority partners in the Middle East."

The announcement came after Russia's ties with Iran, a longtime partner, became strained in recent weeks due to an apparent toughening in Moscow's stance on the Iranian nuclear programme.

On Tuesday, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad lashed out at Russia for supporting a vote by the UN's nuclear watchdog IAEA censuring Tehran over its nuclear plans, in a rare criticism of Moscow by the Iranian leader.

Iranian officials have also complained that Russia is dragging its feet on fulfilling a contract to supply Iran with advanced S-300 surface-to-air missiles.

Iranian Defence Minister Ahmad Vahidi last month called on Russia "to fulfil the contract and not be influenced by Zionist pressure."

Moscow has never officially confirmed the existence of the S-300 contract.

Saudi official: 5 dead from swine flu at hajj

MINA, Saudi Arabia — Five people died from swine flu during the hajj, Saudi Arabia said Sunday, a relatively small number considering the event is the largest annual gathering in the world and is seen as an ideal incubator for the virus.

But some experts warned the true extent of the virus will not be known until pilgrims return to their home countries around the world.

Speaking on the final day of the Islamic pilgrimage, Abdullah al-Rabeeah said authorities recorded 73 cases — including the five deaths — of H1N1, commonly known as swine flu. He said only 10 percent of the some 2.5 million pilgrims were vaccinated against the virus.

"Our safety precautions have secured a very successful and safe hajj for pilgrims from around the world with no infectious disease outbreaks," al-Rabeeah said.

Saudi officials, along with American and international health experts, worked to curb any outbreak during the hajj. Health officials circulated among the sprawling tent camp at Mina where the pilgrims lived and gave the faithful cheek swabs for testing later. They also placed hand sanitizer dispensers on walls in the camps, near public bathrooms and at ritual sites, while pilgrims arriving at Saudi airports were scanned using a thermal camera and offered a free vaccine.

But authorities also are using the pilgrimage as a test case to build a database, watch for mutations and look for lessons on controlling the flu at other large gatherings like the 2010 soccer World Cup in South Africa.

Despite the relatively minor impact of the virus during the hajj, some experts warn there could be cases reported among pilgrims when they return home.

Al-Rabeeah brushed aside such concerns Sunday, saying some pilgrims have been in the country for almost a month, far longer than the weeklong incubation period.

"They've had enough time to show symptoms of swine flu, and that hasn't happened," he said.

But he also stressed Saudi authorities will continue to monitor pilgrims until they leave the country, and urged other countries monitor the pilgrims upon their return home.

On Sunday, Muslim pilgrims performed the hajj's final ritual at the cube-shaped Kaaba — Islam's holiest shrine.

After three days of throwing stones at walls in the desert valley of Mina in a symbolic rejection of Satan's temptation, millions of pilgrims crammed into buses and trucks for the short trip back to Mecca to circle the Kaaba, marking the traditional end of the hajj.

Many of the men making the pilgrimage had shed their traditional white robes in favor of Western clothing. Many had shaved heads, done on the first day of stoning as a symbol of renewal.

The Muslims believe that they are cleared of all sins if they perform a sincere pilgrimage.

A total of 2.5 million pilgrims attended the hajj this year, the governor of the Mecca region, Prince Khaled Al-Faisal, told a news conference, according to the state-run SPA news agency.

Saudi officials earlier had said they expected this year's attendance to be higher than last year's 3 million. But for days, there have been reports that real attendance was lower because of swine flu fears, and Saudi Arabia had recommended that the elderly and very young not come because they are more vulnerable to the virus.

Rush, Stompin' Tom Connors, Tom Cochrane among SOCAN Award winners

TORONTO — Tom Cochrane, Rush, Stompin' Tom Connors and Kardinal Offishall were among those honoured by the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada at its 20th annual awards gala on Monday night.

Connors, the 73-year-old country-folk legend who issued his 50th album in 2008, was given a lifetime achievement award for outstanding success throughout his music career.

Rush, meanwhile, took the international achievement honour after another successful year of touring and the release of "Snakes & Arrows Live," while Rita MacNeil received the national achievement award for success in the Canadian music industry over her career.

"It's a great honour," said MacNeil, who flew in earlier Monday from Cape Breton, N.S. "Coming here tonight has been really great fun - it's good to see an old soul like me still going."

SOCAN, which is the Canadian copyright collective for the communication and performance of musical works, also recognized songs that were played 100,000 times on Canadian radio in 2008.

Cochrane led the way with awards for five such tunes: "Big League," "Boy Inside the Man," "I Wish You Well," "No Regrets," and "Lunatic Fringe," which he released in 1981, never thinking it would still be on the radio nearly three decades later.

"That song has stood the test of time, and it just has garnered a lot of radio play over the years - I never thought it would," Cochrane told The Canadian Press just after arriving at the gala.

Cochrane noted he demoed the song the same night John Lennon died, and his feelings after the murder galvanized him to release the song despite the input of industry peers who didn't think the track was commercial enough.

"I never thought it would see the light of day but it did - I guess you have to follow your heart," he said.

Vancouver's 54-40 earned awards for two songs that received major radio play ("I Go Blind" and "Ocean Pearl"), as did Carolyn Dawn Johnson ("Complicated" and "I Don't Want You to Go") and Marc Jordan ("I Fall From Grace" and "This," which was performed by Rod Stewart).

Glass Tiger's "My Town," Ian Thomas's "Pilot" and Stephan Moccio and Aldo Caporuscio's "A New Day Has Come," as performed by Celine Dion, also made the list, along with Gordon Lightfoot's "Race Among the Ruins."

Lightfoot, like Cochrane, didn't realize at the time that the song would have such longevity.

"No, I really did not," said Lightfoot, who stood out wearing a bright red blazer with his white hair pulled back. "I understood though it was a great one to play onstage ... I believe that is why it remains in view."

The society also dispensed awards for the songs that received the most domestic radio play in 2008.

Finger Eleven of Burlington, Ont., were recognized for "I'll Keep Your Memory Vague" while also taking the award for international song for "Paralyzer," which reached No. 6 on the U.S. charts and was certified double-platinum there in 2008.

Feist was also honoured for her hit "1234," while the other pop/rock artists acknowledged for domestic airplay were Kreesha Turner, whose "Don't Call Me Baby" was written by Jon Levine and Anjulie Persaud, and Hedley, for "For the Nights I Can't Remember."

In the country music category, Gord Bamford's "Stayed 'Til Two," Doc Walker's "Beautiful Life," and Deric Ruttan's "First Time in a Long Time" received SOCAN awards for their airplay.

Kardinal Offishall's "Dangerous" took the urban music award after winning the Juno Award for single of the year in March. The song, which featured St. Louis-based R&B crooner Akon, reached No. 2 on the Canadian charts and No. 5 in the United States.

One of the few Canadian hip-hop artists to receive major airplay south of the border, he said it takes extremely hard work to get noticed there as a Canuck rapper.

"Unfortunately we have a little bit of a double-edged sword living so close to the States because we see a lot of their hoop dreams and we think, 'Oh, that could happen to us,' but we don't realize our infrastructure is different," he said.

"So we have to do what they're doing in the States except times a million."

Corb Lund took the roots/folk music award for domestic radio after watching multiple singles from 2007's "Horse Soldier! Horse Soldier!" make the Canadian country music chart.

Ottawa-born composer James Rolfe won the Jan V. Matejcek award for overall success in new classical music, while Cuban-Canadian singer-songwriter Alex Cuba took the Hagood Hardy award for overall success in jazz, instrumental or world music.

"This comes at the tail end of a beautiful year for me," Cuba said just prior to the gala.

Toronto-based publicist Richard Flohil received the special achievement award for his career contributions to the Canadian music industry.

SOCAN will recognize francophone music creators at a gala in Montreal on Nov. 24.

St. John's floats idea of toll highway

A long-standing dispute between St. John's and nearby Mount Pearl over who should pay maintenance costs on a highway that'll eventually run through both cities has resurfaced, with the mayor of St. John's now suggesting toll booths be set up to charge some drivers to use the road.

Team Gushue Highway — named after Brad Gushue, who skipped Canada to a gold medal in men's curling at the 2006 Torino Olympics — currently connects the Outer Ring Road with Kenmount Road in St. John's.

When it's finished in 2011, the highway will connect Kenmount Road to the Goulds Bypass Road.

The costs to clear snow and maintain the road are estimated at $700,000 a year.

St. John's wants Mount Pearl to pay 25 per cent of that bill, arguing that up to half of the drivers who use it are from that city.

But the council in Mount Pearl is refusing to pay any money towards upkeep, arguing that it's a provincial road, and the province should foot the bill.

"It is part of a provincial roads network," said Mayor Randy Simms. "We're not going to get sucked into allowing the province to download that highway on us."

On Monday evening, at the weekly St. John's council meeting, O'Keefe said Mount Pearl should be more willing to share the costs.

"For that kind of money to be, and that burden to be, shouldered by the residents and taxpayers of this city, given the fact that it's going to have such a terrific impact on both of our cities, is unreasonable and unfair."

O'Keefe told CBC News that one way or another, Mount Pearl will pay towards the upkeep.

"I've actually asked the city to have a look at it and see if we could toll that highway. If we could find a way to toll that highway, in such a way that the residents of the city would not have to pay, because they're already paying through their taxes, and those who are using it would pay a toll."

O'Keefe said the dispute points to the benefits of amalgamation, as the two city councils are fighting over a highway that is "going to serve both cities extremely well."

The idea of the two cities becoming one has been a sensitive issue for years, with past provincial governments pursuing the idea, but backing off after fierce opposition from Mount Pearl.

Imagionary Portraits By Walter Pater

In Asia, Obama talking climate, arms control

SINGAPORE — President Barack Obama and other world leaders agreed Sunday that next month's much-anticipated climate change summit will be merely a way station, not the once hoped-for end point, in the search for a worldwide global warming treaty.

The 192-nation climate conference beginning in three weeks in Copenhagen had originally been intended to produce a new global climate-change treaty. Hopes for that have dimmed lately. But comments by Obama and fellow leaders at a hastily arranged breakfast meeting here on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific summit served to put the final nail in any remaining expectations for the December summit.

"There was an assessment by the leaders that it is unrealistic to expect a full internationally, legally binding agreement could be negotiated between now and Copenhagen which starts in 22 days," said Michael Froman, Obama's deputy national security adviser for international economic matters.

The prime minister of Denmark, Lars Loekke Rasmussen, the U.N.-sponsored climate conference's chairman, flew overnight to Singapore to present a proposal to the leaders to instead make the Copenhagen goal a matter of crafting a "politically binding" agreement, in hopes of rescuing some future for the struggling process.

A fully binding legal agreement would be left to a second meeting next year in Mexico City, Froman said.

Obama backed the approach, cautioning the group not to let the "perfect be the enemy of the good," Froman said. Addressing the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum later, Obama talked of the need to limit greenhouse-gas emissions "in Copenhagen and beyond."

Froman said the Danish proposal would call for Copenhagen to produce "operational impact," but he did not explain how that would work or to what it would apply.

A major bill dealing with energy and climate in the U.S., a domestic priority of Obama's, is bogged down in the U.S. Senate with scant hope it would be completed by next month, giving the American president little to show in Copenhagen.

It was unclear Sunday whether he would make the trip.

Obama arrived late Saturday night in Singapore for the annual 21-nation APEC summit that had begun without him early that morning. In remarks to the group Sunday, Obama reached out by announcing that he would host the 2011 gathering in his native Hawaii.

But on trade — the subject of most interest to rapidly growing, commerce-happy East and Southeast Asia — Obama had a good-news, bad-news message. He said the U.S. would engage with nations in a Trans Pacific free-trade partnership to shape a new regional agreement, a move seen as crucial to creating a possible Asia-Pacific free trade zone.

But he said the pact must have broad-based membership and "the high standards worthy of a 21st century trade agreement." He also sounded a sterner note, cautioning that Asia's export-led growth must give way to more balanced strategies.

His chief focus, though, was more on side meetings, including one later Sunday with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev where he hoped to nudge forward a major new arms-control pact. The two nations are in talks on a successor to a Cold War-era agreement that expires in December.

Obama and Medvedev agreed in April to reach a new nuclear arms reduction treaty to replace and expand upon the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty before it expires on Dec. 5. Later, in Moscow in July, they agreed further to cut the number of nuclear warheads each nation possesses to between 1,500 and 1,675 within seven years.

U.S. officials say the two nations now have agreed on the broad outlines of a new treaty, which might be signed during Obama's travels to Europe in early December to accept the Nobel Peace Prize.

Obama also was sitting down with Indonesia's Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, president of the world's largest Muslim nation and Obama's home as a boy.

And the president planned another milestone: joining a larger meeting of the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations that includes the leader of military-ruled Myanmar, also known as Burma. Obama is sure to face criticism at home, particularly from conservatives, for doing so.

A U.S. president has never met with a leader of the Burmese junta, one of the world's worst human-rights offenders.

In a final communique from that meeting, ASEAN leaders devoted a section to Myanmar. While the document calls for a general election in Myanmar next year to be "conducted in a free, fair, inclusive and transparent manner in order to be credible to the international community," it makes no mention of the release of political prisoners.

Obama, in a broad policy speech in Tokyo on Saturday, made a point of mentioning Aung San Suu Kyi by name and others imprisoned for political reasons.

But the leaders' statement does not make any mention of political prisoners — including Nobel Peace laureate Suu Kyi, who has spent 14 of the last 20 years in detention. The omission is glaring, given the U.S. had insisted on the inclusion of the clause in a previous draft.

Associated Press writers Desmond Butler in Washington and Charles Hutzler and Vijay Joshi in Singapore contributed to this report.

Life in the royal bubble has moments of levity, lots of running

MONTREAL — Ever wonder what it's like in that royal bubble when the heir to the throne and his wife come to call?

For one thing, Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, come with their own crowd. Not your typical well-wishers, though. Their shadows are a small army of security, their own staff, Canadian government officials, assistants and media.

"The analogy is the graceful swan swimming on the water and yet the little feet underneath are swimming up a storm," says Kevin MacLeod, the Canadian secretary to the Queen and the visit co-ordinator.

And if you're among those little feet, scurrying to keep up with the fast-moving entourage? First tip - bring food. And comfortable shoes.

That's because otherwise you won't eat and you'll run like a marathoner.

Not that the prince does any better. He's like some regal Jack Bauer, the hard-driving anti-terror agent on TV's "24," who is never seen eating or making a pit stop.

"They have a very good breakfast and a very good dinner," says MacLeod. They want to get from one event to the other and meet people.

And they did plenty of that during their 11-day visit, which wrapped Thursday.

Organizing a trip like the one just ended is no small thing. You don't just throw together a schedule and point the royals at it. They have things they want to do, issues they want to address.

Like Jack Bauer, Charles gets from one end of the city he's visiting to another in record time - thanks to motorcycle escorts and enough flashing lights to put any self-respecting pinball arcade to shame.

Forget pulling out of your parking space - or going anywhere - when you see a royal motorcade coming. Turn that steering wheel and you'll find a leather-jacketed motorcycle cop planting himself in front of you and raising his hand to signal it's OK for the cavalcade to pass.

It prompts lots of gawking from the sidewalks. Cellphone cameras are raised. People wave, even to the media and the Mounties.

The royal motorcades usually number around a dozen cars and vans, many of them hauling around burly RCMP officers, who talk into tiny microphones in their sleeves - sort of a new variation on the catchphrase "talk to the hand" - and rotate their heads like turrets when they form a protective box around the couple.

Media, both Canadian and British, are stuffed into the other vans. The Brits squint at the local landmarks as they whizz past the motorcade.

They recognized Montreal's Olympic Stadium - and wondered whether the famously over-budget building has finally been paid off yet.

The RCMP officers driving in the motorcade fire it along the road like a bullet. At top speed, they usually burst through a usually traffic-heavy downtown core at 100 km-h.

The speed continues when the vehicles stop. While the royals disembark with the grace expected from a future king, everyone else pretty much spills out like clowns out of those little cars at the circus.

Handlers spur everyone on with waves and shouts of, "Let's go, let's go, stay close."

When it's remarked that it's good to be in shape for a day like this, the reply is: "Yes, it is."

When the royals are on the road, two offices - one for the Canadian government and one for Buckingham Palace representatives - are up and running, as MacLeod says.

Documents are updated, faxes fly, concerns are ironed out - "all types of things that are really for all intents and purposes pieces of a larger jigsaw puzzle that have to come together."

One of the week's biggest hurdles was the demonstration by sovereigntists in Montreal on Tuesday.

That delayed Charles and Camilla's arrival at a military ceremony by about a half-hour, and the royals had to enter through a back door because of the raucous demonstators.

"That was one small issue in a 10-day program which involved somewhere between 60 and 70 major events," MacLeod says. "By and large. . .the reaction, the reception they received was incredibly positive."

It was rather informal at times.

When it rained in Hamilton, Ont., the royal couple were handed their own umbrellas and hoisted them aloft. It was positively pedestrian comportment, compared with a recent visit to the same province by a TV star.

During her stop in Toronto a few weeks ago, Pamela Anderson had bodyguards hold her umbrella over her head during a downpour when she visited Queen's Park for a protest.

There are protocols, though.

You can't talk to the royals if you're in the media. There's none of that shouting of questions that brings that momentary grimace from politicians. Journalists covering the royals simply watch. They strain to hear what's being said, like when Charles surprised a New Brunswick tourist in Montreal.

"I'm sorry for interrupting your shopping trip," he told her with a grin and a handshake.

The woman said later she wasn't sure what he was talking about. She wasn't shopping, she said. Could have been that famously dry Brit wit.

Ah, the handshakes. That's another wrinkle, considering the fear gripping Canada with daily stories about the spread of H1N1.

MacLeod says that right from the first day, all the Canadians and British working on the event were reminded about the Health Canada guidelines to combat the flu. Hands were checked.

"If there were some people who were reticent about shaking hands, then certainly no offence would be taken by the Royal Family if a hand wasn't extended in terms of greeting because public safety, public health comes first."

There are occasional snafus.

Take Charles' visit to the Stella Burry Community Services Centre in St. John's, NL.

He was unveiling another one of the plaques that herald his visits around the world. But beside it was a object covered up with a white sheet, so Charles did the natural thing: he whipped off that cloak, too, with great fanfare. It was a parking meter.

Charles looked surprised for a moment before bursting into laughter. So did the crowd.

"I think maybe the city of St. John's should unveil a plaque saying this parking meter belongs to the Prince of Wales," MacLeod joked.

Southern Ontario team an option for NHL: Daly

Deputy NHL commissioner Bill Daly on Monday attempted to close the book on any debate the Toronto Maple Leafs own a veto to prohibit a team to set up shop in nearby Hamilton.

Speaking at a sports management conference in Toronto, Daly said the league doesn't need the Maple Leafs' approval to bring a franchise to southern Ontario.

"They can be dead-set against it," he said, "but that doesn't mean they can stop the league from putting a franchise here if the league thinks a franchise here makes sense."

According to a section in the NHL constitution, a new NHL city requires the consent of 75 per cent of all league members.

But section 4.3 states: "No franchise shall be granted for a home territory within the home territory of a member, without the written consent of such member."

Balsillie's legal team has contended the veto exists and violates U.S. antitrust law because it essentially allows the Maple Leafs to operate as a monopoly.

In the constitution, teams are said to have exclusive territorial rights in the city in which it is located and within 80 kilometres from that city's corporate limits.

With Hamilton's Copps Coliseum located 67 km from the Air Canada Centre in Toronto, it appears the Maple Leafs veto is in effect.

Toronto general manager Brian Burke said during a panel discussion that his team would not be opposed to another in southern Ontario if a strong business case were made in such a scenario.

Daly noted Hamilton is not currently an option for the NHL because Copps Coliseum, "doesn't provide modern-day NHL economics."

Canadian businessman Jim Balsillie tried to buy the Phoenix Coyotes out of bankruptcy court this summer and relocate them to Hamilton to play out of a renovated Copps. Daly described the planned arena upgrades as "a pie-in-the-sky kind of deal."

When Balsillie, the co-chief executive officer of Research In Motion — maker of BlackBerry mobile devices — tried and failed to purchase the Pittsburgh Penguins in 2006 and the Nashville Predators in 2007, he was prepared to spend upward of $160 million to renovate Copps Coliseum.

Chopper instantly filled with icy water after N.L. crash, sole survivor says

ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — Robert Decker clung to the seat in front of him when the pilot of Cougar Flight 491 called over the helicopter's PA: "Ditching, ditching, ditching!" moments before it hit the North Atlantic.

The lone survivor of the disaster March 12 described the doomed aircraft's last terrifying seconds to an inquiry packed with loved ones of the 17 people who died that day.

"I guess almost as soon as they said 'Ditch' the helicopter lost control," Decker said Thursday in his first detailed public account of the tragedy.

"I was looking out my window for most of it so I knew when we were going to hit the water."

The 28-year-old said the chopper's bow came up slightly and the aircraft turned quickly to its starboard, or right side, just before it crashed about 60 kilometres east of St. John's.

"The next thing I can remember was waking up in a submerged helicopter," Decker said.

"It was instantly filled with water ... it was kind of as if it was sinking the same way it was dropping through the sky."

Decker kept his emotions tightly in check, except for when he fought tears as he thanked the rescuers who saved him.

He has worked since 2006 as a weather and ice observer with Provincial Aerospace. He had flown about 50 times to the three offshore oil sites about 300 kilometres east of St. John's before that ill-fated trip.

Decker had been asleep in a window seat along the starboard of the Sikorsky S-92A. A passenger woke him up just as the pilot announced a mechanical problem that forced the flight to turn back toward land.

He initially didn't think much of it.

It was a cold, clear day that seemed ideal for flying, Decker said. He wasn't supposed to head out until the next day but had received a call the night before asking him to move up his trip because of ice conditions at sea.

Window seats are coveted, and people try to "muscle" to the head of pre-boarding lineups to get them, he told the inquiry.

"Everybody's looking for the most comfortable seats so you don't have to sit next to anyone or the auxiliary fuel tank," Decker said.

He stressed in later testimony that it would have been "next to impossible" for those in seats away from the windows to escape."I just can't see how this person would ever stand a chance," he said, pointing to a rear inside seat on a diagram of the chopper's layout.

There was an auxiliary fuel tank blocking windows on the port, or left side, of the helicopter.

After the crash, the chopper was dimly lit from the glow emitted by the survival suits that each passenger had hastily zipped up in the flight's last moments. The lights are activated by water, Decker said.

Fighting immense water pressure inside the plummeting aircraft, he unbuckled his seatbelt, escaped through the broken window beside him and floated toward the light above.

He managed to inflate a pillow-like flotation collar on his suit to keep his head above water once he broke the surface. But he couldn't get to two lifeboats floating nearby nor fully use his hands because the cold water numbed his fingers.

Trying to swim with a ruptured vertebrae, dislocated ankle and broken sternum "was a losing battle," he said.

Decker remembered worrying that he was paralyzed until he realized he could move his toes. He talked and sang to himself to keep panic at bay, though the fear of internal bleeding gripped him.

Decker had also inhaled sea water, though he doesn't remember fighting for breath.

He recalled seeing a Provincial Aerospace plane flying toward him. At one point he fought panic again as the plane appeared to turn around.

He knew he'd been spotted when the aircraft flew low over him and tipped its wings.

A Cougar search and rescue helicopter arrived later and a basket was lowered. But by then, Decker was hypothermic and could hardly move because of the icy water that had seeped into his survival suit. His body temperature on arrival at a hospital was logged at 28 C, nine degrees below normal.

Rescue swimmer Ian Wheeler, the leader of Cougar's in-house search and rescue team, was lowered into the sea beside Decker, who said he was almost blind and irrational with shock by that point.

Decker thought he recalled Wheeler yelling something about needing to go back for another piece of equipment.

He remembered grabbing Wheeler, begging him: "Please don't leave me here."

Decker was hoisted into the chopper and rushed to a St. John's hospital where he remained for nearly three weeks.

He said there were long-standing concerns among passengers about survival suits that don't properly fit. And he said the five-day simulated crash training he took in 2006 was inadequate.

"A couple of days of controlled immersion in a pool every few years is not enough to allow anyone to develop the instinctive reactions that they need to have a chance of escaping a helicopter crash like Cougar 491."

He credits his survival to a childhood spent sailing the waters of Conception Bay - and sheer luck.

"Many times I've been thrown into the cold sea water from an overturned boat. I think that experience meant that when the helicopter suddenly filled with icy water I could react instinctively ... it was like a reflex to take a breath and hold it and to stay calm until I could get to the surface," he said.

"I don't think that anyone will ever know why it was that I survived this disaster and the others did not. There probably is no good reason. Just luck."

Decker said he won't fly offshore anymore. But the key to protecting workers who still board choppers everyday lies with the safety of the aircraft, he said.

"Safety starts with the helicopter and I think everything else is secondary."

The inquiry is trying to assess whether the risks of flying to the offshore are as low as is reasonably practical.

Union leader Sheldon Peddle, who represents about 700 offshore workers, said he is confident Cougar is a cautious operator. It's the Sikorsky S-92A he's not sure about.

"With all of the issues that we're seeing, I just hope we don't have another crash," he said.

Sikorsky officials were called this week to inspect the main gearbox of an S-92 to determine what caused a hairline crack on a chopper based in Halifax.

Two international aviation regulatory agencies also recently issued directives that mandate visual inspections of the mounting feet of S-92s after every 10 hours of flight.

The Transportation Safety Board is still probing the crash, but investigators have said that a mounting stud on the filter bowl assembly broke, causing a loss of oil to the main gearbox.

Contraband cigarettes seized

An Ontario man is facing charges in Manitoba after he was found to be transporting contraband cigarettes.

The man was arrested Monday afternoon when he was stopped by a police officer for an equipment violation on his van, RCMP said.

The officer was patrolling the Trans-Canada Highway near Angle Road in Portage la Prairie at around 1:30 p.m. when he noticed the van was missing the rear bumper and a tie down strap was hanging out the back.

When he approached the van, the officer noticed a large quantity of cigarettes in the rear of the vehicle, RCMP said.

The driver, a 31-year-old man from Ontario who currently lives in British Columbia, was arrested under the Federal Excise Act, and the vehicle was searched.

Police seized 12 cases of contraband cigarettes, each containing 50 cartons, totaling 120,000 cigarettes. The value of the contraband cigarettes is estimated at $24,000.

The driver, whose name has not been released by police, was released on a promise to appear in provincial court on Dec. 10 in Winnipeg.

Charges are pending under the Federal Excise Act and the Provincial Manitoba Tobacco Tax Act, RCMP said. A tax penalty of $66,600 could also be assessed, RCMP added.

The investigation into the matter is continuing.